Love's Vengeance Read Free

faltered and her mother arched a gentle dark brow in question.
    “Yesterday…before we were at the creek, Antoine and I were in the meadow on the upper plateau…talking idly…” she paused.
    “Go ahead, Ma Cherie . I'm listening.”
    Desiree hesitated, unsure whether she should go on. She groaned audibly, standing and pacing about the room. “I…I…” she stammered and then touched her cheeks which were growing warm with the embarrassment she felt as she glanced to her mother, “You'll think me terribly wicked.” She warned.
    “Will I?” Celeste returned calmly.
    “ Oui and it was so humiliating.” Desiree admitted. She stopped before her mother with her hands clasped tightly together before her and then blurted softly and confidentially, “I asked Antoine to kiss me!” She waited in tense anticipation for some reaction but her mother's face was expressionless, “And the worst of it is…the cad refused me! Have you ever heard of such a thing?”
    Celeste stanched her amusement, seeing the real anxiety upon her daughter's face. “It is usually the man who makes such a forward advance. Perhaps you caught him off guard?” she suggested helpfully.
    “Hardly!” Desiree spat, then her brow knitted forlornly and she spoke passionately, “Many girls younger than I are wed. Some already made mothers! And I—I have yet to even sample my first kiss, except in a disgustingly brotherly fashion. Why? Am I so unattractive? Undesirable?” She moved to a large oval mirror across the room and scrutinized her image closely.
    “No sweet….” Celeste began, but was interrupted as Desiree whirled away from the mirror, pacing the room again furiously.
    “He is my friend—he is dear to me and I simply asked him to kiss me…in a fashion that I might know I had been kissed by a man and—and you would have thought I had asked him to commit a crime for me!”
    Celeste attempted to convey concern and appear appalled by such a revelation but laughter was close to the surface, “How ungentlemanly of him!” she gasped.
    “Not only that,” Desiree nodded with new vigor, “but he also told me if I didn't stop talking of such things, he would turn me over his knee! Then he leapt up, declaring that we had been out long enough and fairly forced me to mount the horse. He refused to even discuss it! I tell you Mama—he deserved that dunking! Odd behavior—especially for Antoine of all people. Why—he is no innocent! Not naïve! I've heard gossip of his af...” She stopped short on that confession. “Oh why would he treat me as if I am a leper?”
    “My dear you need to realize that Antoine is your friend and it would be difficult for him to cross that line. He…Rene' Vermillion, Honore' Romains… Philippe—I could name a dozen more! They are all as close to you as family.”
    Desiree sat down heavily beside her mother, speaking wistfully, “I did not ask him to cross any line Mama, only a simple request for a small favor. The same favor he has most assuredly granted a score of women, without their even asking. It is humiliating and so unfair.”
    Desiree studied her folded hands as tears threatened, until she felt her mother’s touch upon her chin and raising her eyes, Desiree waited for some words of wisdom.
    “Sweet—is it, in fact, fair to ask such of him? Of a young man, who for most of his nineteen years has guarded your honor ferociously?”
    Yes he had done that, Desiree reflected silently, as had so many others. The memory came to mind of a summer festival last year on the town square in Rouen. There had been music and dancing and somehow she had found herself with a constant unwelcome companion, a visiting cousin of Antoine’s. He had sidled her off away from the activities, where in no uncertain terms he had made known his desire for her favors with a clumsy, groping hand that had found her décolletage . She had been aghast at his vulgar attempt at seduction and had delivered a sound slap, heaving